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Title: New Technologies in Standards-Based Internetwork Management

Session #: 327

Speaker: Jeffrey D. Case, Ph.D.

Company: SNMP Research

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Topics

• Introduction• Current State-of-the-Art: SNMPv3• Future Directions -- 4 Initiatives

– Ease of use– Enhanced Security for Manager-to-Agent

Communications (SNMPv3 ESO)– Protocol Enhancements (SNMPv3 APO)– XML-based modeling and transport of

management information (XML SNMP)• Conclusions

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SNMP in One Slide Common organization

structure for management information (SMI)

One naming space for all management “objects” (MIB)

Communications Protocol (SNMP)

Manager

Agents

Requests

ResponsesNotificationsGet

Set

Networking EquipmentServers

PCsSoftware Applications

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Secure SNMPv3

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Standards-based Manager-to-Agent Security• The overall goal is to harden today’s

management systems by incorporating protection mechanisms that match the potential level of threat with multiple levels of rings of protection/trust

• Today’s heightened threat level requires heightened protection mechanisms

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Standards-based Manager-to-Agent Security• SNMPv1: 1988 – present

– Plaintext community string, e.g., “public”– no Authentication / no Privacy

• SNMPv2c: 1995 – present– Plaintext community string, e.g., “public”– no Authentication / no Privacy

• SNMPv3: 1998 – present– Strong Authentication, Weak Privacy

• SNMPv3 ESO: 2003 – present(Extended Security Options)– Strong Authentication, Strong Privacy

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Features of SNMPv3: Security and Administration

• Authentication– User-based strong authentication of messages– MD5 or SHA in private key model with localized keys– More than good enough for virtually all applications today

• Privacy– Protect management and configuration data from unauthorized

disclosure– Encrypt SNMP payload for confidentiality– Private key model with localized keys– DES or AES– Standard is extensible for stronger cryptography

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Features of SNMPv3: Security and Administration (Continued)

• Authorization and View-Based Access Control– Authorization: What functions permitted (read, write, notify)– Access Control: Restrictions on what data may be read / written,

potentially very fined grained– Based on groups of SNMPv3 “users”

• An SNMPv3 user might be a system, person, or role• Separation of people and policies• The management application determines how its “users”

(operators) map to SNMPv3 “users”

• Administrative framework to support the above

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SNMPv3 Administrative Framework

• All of this configuration information is stored in Management Information Base (MIB) tables

• Remotely configurable via SNMP operations• Standard supports remote configuration of:

– Users including key management– Groups– Views– Community strings for SNMPv1 & SNMPv2c, if any– Notification destinations– Source-side notification filtering

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AdministrativeWorkstation

NMSHPOV NNM

Firewall

ManagedDevice(s)

Attacker

ManagedSystem(s)

e.g., CIAgentUnclassified

NetworkOperations

Center

SNMPv1/v2 traffic

SNMPv1/SNMPv2c Not Secure

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AdministrativeWorkstation

NMSHPOV NNMwith

SNMP Security

Pack

Firewall

ManagedDevice(s)

Attacker

ManagedSystem(s)

e.g., CIAgent

Unclassified

NetworkOperations

Center

SNMPv3 traffic

Secure SNMPv3

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“Distributed SNMP Security Pack for HP OpenView” Solution• Standards-Based Security Solution with NNM

• Integration was jointly developed by HP and SNMP Research

• Maps outbound SNMPv1/SNMPv2c requests to SNMPv3 requests sent to target agent

• Converts responses from agent into SNMPv1/SNMPv2c, and provides additional information on source address

• Receives notifications (traps and informs) and passes to NNM, OVPI, OVO, etc.

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“Distributed SNMP Security Pack for HP OpenView” Solution• Includes security configuration datastore

• Includes SNMPv3 Configuration Wizard

• Now available from SNMP Research, soon to also be available from HP

• Also available with Remote Forwarder

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Distributed SNMP Security Pack

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Product and Technology Initiatives

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Where are we?

• Now that SNMPv3 is at Full Standard, are we done yet?– Not yet– More to be done

• There are still unmet needs in the area of standards-based Internet management

There is still more to be done

It is still too hard to do right

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The Problem

• It continues to be unnecessarily expensive to develop, deploy, use, and support secure heterogeneous multi-vendor internets consisting of networked devices, systems, applications, and services.

• We need to make this technology easier– For vendors to implement and

– Users to deploy and use

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In The Beginning …

• 15 years ago, we had– Monitoring via proprietary CLI “show” commands

– Configuration and control via proprietary CLI commands

– No programmatic interface, difficult to write scripts, no “expect”

– The definition, implementation, and deployment of the SNMP-based Internet Standard Management Framework made an order-of-magnitude advancement in the state-of-the-art for Internet monitoring

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… and Today

• Standards-based monitoring is now a solved problem for the most part -- now in pervasive and continuous use

• The Internet Standard Management Framework based on SNMPv1 was an instant success that continued to grow

• SNMPv2 was a disaster• SNMPv3 caught on slowly but is now in demand

– The need for security– September 11, 2001 but not limited to USA– Unrelated CERT advisory on SNMPv1 in February 2002– Government Sector: Strong acceptance growth– Private Sector: Public company audits/scrutiny/regulatory

environment

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… and Today

• For a variety of good reasons and poor excuses the frameworks have not been as widely exploited for configuration and control operations as they have been for monitoring operations

• For the configuration and control of many products, we are still stuck where we were 10 to 15 years ago:– Proprietary CLI– No programmatic interface difficult-to-write scripts– Little change control rigor– Poor interoperability within a vendor, none between

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The Goal

• We need to make order-of-magnitude advances in the state-of-the-art for configuration and control operations similar to those made for monitoring over the past 15 years …

• … with an increased level of seamlessness between monitoring and configuration / control

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The Approach

• Execution: Implement and deploy the technology standards we have today

• Extension: Evolve and improve the technology

• Product Initiatives– Ease-of-Use Initiative: Configuration aids, MIBGuide, etc– DSSP: Distributed SNMP Security Pack for management through

firewalls

• Technology Initiatives– Extended Security Options (ESO Initiative)– Advanced Protocol Operations (APO Initiative)– XML-Based Internet Management (XML SNMP Initiative

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Ease of Use Initiative

Security Configuration Tools, MIBGuide, etc

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Configuration Management Issues

• Users, keys, notifications, etc. must be configured on both managers and agents

• Keys are generated from pass-phrases and localized, pass-phrases not stored on managed devices

• Keys need to be changed periodically• Configuration must be updated in a timely manner

(e.g., deny rights to a terminated employee)• Configuration needs to be done remotely from a

security management station, using a secure and private method

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SNMPv3 Remote Administration

• Need to configure manager platforms and agents in accordance with enterprise policies

• Can do it with “vi” or “edit” but really need something more friendly and powerful

• Security dependent on correct configurations• Wizard and/or policy-based tools• Configurable agents• Configurable managers

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NMSe.g., NNM

with SNMP

Security Pack

OtherManagementPlatforms andApplicationswith SNMP

Security Packe.g., OVPI

NetworkOperations

CenterFirewall

ManagedDevice(s)Security Administration

WorkstationConfiguration Wizard

and/orEnterPol Simple Policy Pro

ManagedSystem(s)

e.g., CIAgent

SNMPv3 Remote Administration

Unclassified

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Configuration Management Applications• Configuration Management applications are very

helpful to reduce complexity and human error– One agent at a time “wizard” application

• Included with the standards-based security solution for NNM, i.e., the SNMP Security Pack for HP OpenView NNM

– Policy-based, multiple-target distribution application

• Available separately

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SNMPv3 Configuration Wizard

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Policy-based SNMP Configuration Management

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MIBGuide

• Comprehensive toolset to design and develop multi-protocol accessible agents using a graphical Integrated Development Environment (IDE).

• Ease-of-use– Ease the burden of creating MIB documents and

developing, testing, and deploying agents.

• Productivity tool• Quality improvement by design not inspection

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Secure Manager-to-Agent Communications Initiative

Extended Security Options

(SNMPv3 ESO)

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SNMPv3 ESO: Extended Security Options• SNMPv3 framework designed to be extensible and

allow additional security models including new– Authentication algorithms and mechanisms– Privacy algorithms and mechanisms

• ESO uses this to add two new strong privacy algorithms– Advanced Encryption Standard (AES) in 128 bit

CBC mode– Triple DES (3DES) in 168 bit EDE CBC mode

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SNMPv3 with ESO Yields

• Multiple authentication options: (Same as before)– None, Strong, Stronger

• Multiple privacy options: (Two new ones)– None, Weak, Strong, Stronger

• Multiple strong authentication algorithms and multiple strong privacy algorithms provide hot standby replacements if one is believed to be compromised

• Reconfigure rather than redeploy

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SNMPv3 with ESO:Potentially more Secure

AdministrativeWorkstation

Firewalls

ManagedDevice(s)

Attacker

ManagedSystem(s)

e.g., CIAgent

NetworkOperations

Center

SNMPv3 traffic

NMSHPOV NNM

withSNMP

Security Pack

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SNMPv3 ESO Availability(in some countries)• SNMPv3 ESO available today for:

– HP OpenView NNM and HP Extensible Agent– Other management platforms– Some embedded systems (e.g., Marconi ATM switches)– Most open systems– Other

• Future ESO work– Articulation with other systems

• Radius• TACACS+• Etc

– Integrated Security Model for SNMP (ISMS)

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Protocol Enhancements Initiative

Advanced Protocol Operations(SNMPv3 APO)

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Protocol Evolution

Generation Protocol

Operations Transport Mappings

Security & Administration

1st RFC 1157

(1988–1993)

Community- based

2nd RFC 3416

(1993-now)

RFC 3417

(1993-now)

Party-based RFC 1445-47 (1993-1995)

3rd APO

(new work)

XML

(new work)

User-based RFC 3410-15 (1998-now)

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Advanced Protocol Operations (APO) Initiative• 3rd Generation Protocol Operations

– 1st Generation: RFC 1157

– 2nd Generation: RFC 1448 RFC 1905 RFC 3416

• 2 Levels– APO Level 1: Compatible with SMIv2 MIB

documents

– APO Level 2: A superset – requires enhancements to MIB grammar

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Advanced Protocol Operations (APO) Initiative• APO Level 1: Compatible with SMIv2 MIB docs

– Aggregate objects formerly unaccessible• Row Operations

• Tabular Operations

– OID Suppression

– Improved read operations, e.g., GetBulk scoping, etc

– Improved write operations, e.g., improved error handling, applications specific error codes, etc

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Data Format: Traditional Way vs New Ways

TblNam.1.C1.R1=val,TblNam.1.C2.R1=val,…,TblNam.1.Cm.R1=valTblNam.1.C1.R2=val,TblNam.1.C2.R2=val,…,TblNam.1.Cm.R2=val…TblNam.1.C1.Rn=val,TblNam.1.C2.Rn=val,…,TblNam.1.Cm.Rn=val

versus (explicit) or (implicit)

TblNam.0={ TblNam.0={ {1={1=val, 2=val, ..., m=val}}, {1={val, val, …, val}}, {2={1=val, 2=val, ..., m=val}}, {2={val, val, …, val}}, …, …, {n={1=val, 2=val, ..., m=val}} {n={val, val, …, val}}} }

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Advanced Protocol Operations (APO) Initiative• APO Level 2: Akin to the IETF’s suspended work on SMI-DS within

the SMI-NG WG– All of APO Level 1, plus …– Union, Struct, Array, Row, Table– Data-type maintenance, i.e., Integer64, Unsigned64– Nesting, e.g., something like this within a table

– IPAddress struct {AddressType INTEGER,union {IPv4Address OCTET STRING (SIZE(4)),IPv6Address OCTET STRING (SIZE(16))

}}

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APO Benefits

• Suppression of redundant information yields network and processing efficiencies – 2x to 10x not unusual

• Think in the abstraction that is most natural– A row is a row, a table is a table

• Operations on meta-objects easier for some people to understand and code correctly– Somewhat easier on read operations– A lot easier on thorny configuration operations

• XML initiative builds on APO initiatives

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XML-based Modeling and Transport of Management Information Initiative

XML-based Internet Management(XML SNMP)

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XML Transport Mapping Initiative

• XML-Based Internet Management means different things to different people– XML-ification of proprietary CLI: a factor of 2

incremental improvement– XML-ification of standards-based management data:

an order-of-magnitude advancement– XML transport of entirely new and different data

model(s): an order of magnitude backwards– … many more …

• These are not mutually exclusive and can coexist

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XML Initiative

• XML-Based Internet Management

• Lacking a catchy marketing name

• Stream over TCP connection

• ASCII rather than compact binary encodings

• Respond to market demand

• Need to be careful not to repeat history: – re-solving the solved problem – while not solving the unsolved problems and– creating new problems

• Avoid political wars

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SNMPv3 over UDP through Firewalls

OV

SNMPv3 / UDPthrough firewalls

NMSe.g., NNM

with SNMPSecurity Pack

Sun

CIAgent

HP

CIAgent

XP

CIAgent

Linux

CIAgentInternet Device

with SNMP AgentInternet Device

with SNMP Agent

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Management Traffic in XML tunnel through Firewalls

ManagementInformationin XML over

SSL over TCPthrough firewalls

DistributedSNMP

SecurityPack

SNMPv1/v2/v3over UDP locally

DistributedSNMP

SecurityPack

OV

XP

CIAgent

NMS e.g., NNMwith

DistributedSNMP

Security Pack

Sun

CIAgent

Linux

CIAgent

HP

CIAgentInternet Device

with SNMP AgentInternet Device

with SNMP Agent

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NNM with SNMP Security Pack and XML

ConfigWizard

OtherSecured

Applications

OtherApplications

SNMPv2 SNMPv3 XMLSNMPv3 ESOSNMPv1

Security Layer

Applications

NNM

LCD

RemoteAdmin

Network Layer

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Multiprotocol Agent Architecture with XML

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Summary

• SNMP Security Pack is a pragmatic solution for adding secure SNMPv3 capability to NNM– After security credentials have been configured, operation

using Security Pack is transparent to NNM functions– Includes “SNMPv3 Configuration Wizard” application for

configuration of agents– Supported on HP-UX, Solaris, and Windows

• Additional work underway– Security enhancements: ESO initiative– Protocol enhancements: APO initiative– Transport enhancements: XML initiative– Ease-of-use enhancements: MIBGuide initiative

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For More Information

• Exhibit Area

• Session 325: Wednesday, June 21, 8:30-9:30– Standards-based Secure Management of Networks, Systems, Applications and

Services using SNMPv3 and HP OpenView

• ESO: http://www.snmp.com/protocol/eso.html

• APO: http://www.snmp.com/protocol/apo.html

• XML: http://www.snmp.com/protocol/xml.html

Dr. Jeff Case3001 Kimberlin Heights RoadKnoxville, TN 37920USA+1 865 573 1434case@snmp.com